Justice for Shrewsbury Pickets National Committee

The Conspiracy Continues Defeat the Conspirators

1st September, 12 noon, Unite HQ, Liverpool, L3 8EF

40 years ago, striking building workers met upstairs at the Bull & Stirrup, Chester, to plan a normal day of official picketing. Police escorted the pickets all day. Apart from minor scuffles, everything was peaceful; most sites supported the strike, no arrests were made. Des Warren was congratulated on his conduct of a site meeting by the officer in charge, and shook his hand.

However, behind closed doors, employers and their political representatives were determined to criminalise picketing. They conspired with the judiciary and police chiefs to secure high-profile convictions for ‘conspiracy’. The whole labour movement recognised the Shrewsbury convictions as a trumped-up justification for the anti-trade union laws that followed. Most Labour politicians accepted this attack without a struggle, and most trade union leaders fell into line behind them.

Today, behind closed doors, the capitalist conspiracy continues. The rich are using the bankers’ debt to dismantle the social infrastructure that everybody apart from the rich depends on. Again most Labour politicians are accepting these attacks without a struggle, and most trade union leaders are falling into line behind them.

If we cannot organise and picket, we cannot defend our sick and elderly.

This rank and file conference has been called to re-examine the links between today’s struggles and the struggles left unresolved by the Shrewsbury convictions – casualisation, bogus self-employment, blacklisting, inadequate H&S standards and inspection, ‘nod-and-a-wink’ covert collusion between employers, politicians, judiciary, police and most of the media against trade unionists, and, worst of all, Labour politicians who put bankers before the sick and elderly.

This conference is about defeating the bankers and the anti-trade union laws in defence of our social infrastructure.